


For Great Justice

by DGCatAniSiri



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-23
Updated: 2014-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-05 20:41:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1831582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DGCatAniSiri/pseuds/DGCatAniSiri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After everything in the endgame, Hawke and Anders need a serious discussion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Great Justice

Hawke and his companions made their way from the Gallows as quickly as possible, unsure how long the templars would stand around, staring at what remained of Knight-Commander Meredith. Isabela steered the ship back towards the Docks, while she muttered about the templars coming after them. Hawke just sighed, leaning against the railing, considering everything that had happened since they’d responded to Orsino’s letter. The Chantry blowing up, Sebastian swearing revenge for Hawke sparing Anders, the demons rampaging across the docks (if the bastard who summoned the army of shades, a couple desire demons, and a Maker-damned pride demon wasn’t already dead...), Orsino becoming that... creature, Meredith ordering their deaths and revealing that she’d purchased the red lyrium idol from Bartrand, and the fight with her... Hard to believe that it had only been a few hours. 

As the ship settled into its dock, Carver sat down next to his older brother. “What’s the next step, brother?” he asked. He’d matured in his time with the Grey Wardens. When they’d first come to Kirkwall, that statement would have been clipped, ‘brother’ coming out as almost a slur. Now, though, it was simply a question. Carver was willing to follow his older brother’s lead.

Hawke rubbed the back of his neck, letting his uncertainty show. “I don’t know. But I think we’ve outstayed our welcome in Kirkwall.”

“That’s probably the understatement of a lifetime,” Varric said with a grim chuckle. He had Bianca out, cleaning the blood of dead templars and blood mages off of her. 

Hawke nodded. “True enough. Which means we’ve got until the templars change their minds and regroup before they come after us. Go home and get what you can carry. We’ll meet back here and head somewhere safe once we’re underway.” Then he paused and looked to Anders, who had been very quiet and, for the most part, shunned by the others since rejoining them at the Gallows. “Anders, you’ll come with me.”

“Is that wise?” Fenris asked, voicing the question that everyone was thinking. “He’s responsible for all of this. We should have just left him with the templars.” He sneered at Anders, clearly thinking that leaving him with the templars wasn’t punishment enough, despite the fact that between being an abomination and the man responsible for destroying the Chantry, being made Tranquil was not going to be punishment enough. Abandoning Anders was condemning him to an instant death sentence.

He was also the man that Hawke had fallen in love with. Now, he had to figure out how to deal with everything that had happened. Hawke wasn’t thrilled with having to make things up on the fly, though after seven years of doing just that, he should probably have been used to it.

Hawke glared at Fenris. “Wise or not, it’s my decision.”

Fenris harrumphed. “Fine then. I have nothing of value at Denarius’s mansion. I’ll remain here and guard the ship.”

“Your choice. Anyone else staying?”

Isabela grinned as she surveyed the ships in the dock, several of them far larger than the rickety barge that was the usual method of transport from the Gallows to the Docks. “You can stay on this ship if you want, love, but I think I’ve spotted a few nicer vessels, just waiting.” She looked to Hawke and Aveline, the two most likely to voice a complaint with her desire to upgrade their getaway vehicle.

Right now, Hawke didn’t care. Aveline looked around at the party. “At the moment, it probably doesn’t matter,” she said, shaking her head, indicating Isabela had her ‘blessing.’ But she was still visibly uncomfortable. “Not that it matters for me. I’m staying in Kirkwall. My place is here. My duty is here. My husband is here. Donnic will never abandon this city in its time of need, and neither will I.” Her tone was regretful. She’d supported Hawke from meeting him and his family on the road away from Lothering. It had been seven years now, and she was essentially a Hawke in all but name. 

Hawke figured they only had a few minutes to make plans, though he didn’t know for sure how long it would take for the templars to reorganize. And that meant that he didn’t have time to even try to convince her to change her mind. “Aveline... I suppose I can’t change your mind.”

“You know better than that, Hawke.” She moved to embrace her friend. Hawke returned it, and even Isabela and Fenris looked regretful at her remaining behind. Aveline looked at the group, giving them a sad smile. “This isn’t goodbye. I’ll find you all again, once things settle down here. Count on it.” She looked to Isabela. “I still have to bring you to justice.”

Isabela smirked. “You can try any time you like, Captain.”

Aveline looked back to Hawke. “I’ll accompany you back to your estate, then I’ll head to the Keep, organize the Guard, try and buy you some more time to escape.”

“Thank you, Aveline.” Hawke looked to the group. “Carver, Anders? You’re coming with us.”

Varric motioned for Merrill to come with him. “C’mon, Daisy. We’ll head to Lowtown, gather your things, then grab what we can from the Hanged Man.” 

The elven mage nodded, seeming excited for the opportunity to adventure beyond the walls of Kirkwall.

Hawke and company, including his trusty mabari, made their way back to Hightown. Between Aveline accompanying them and the general state of chaos that Kirkwall was currently in, they weren’t accosted by anyone. Hawke wondered if they would fare as well on the return trip. Still, that did mean that they made it to the estate without trouble, which was a feat. In fact, it was probably the first time in the history of Hawke’s stay in Kirkwall.

Aveline, having already made her goodbyes, merely gave Hawke a brief nod and headed for the Keep. Hawke led the others into the estate.

“You did well for yourself, Brother,” Carver said as he took in the place. It dawned on Hawke that, as comfortable a pattern as they had fallen into when Carver rejoined them back in Lowtown, he and his brother hadn’t had a conversation together since... Truly, since they’d still been stuck in Gamlen’s hovel, talking about Bethany and father, years ago. And Carver hadn’t managed to see the boon of their expedition into the Deep Roads. 

Speaking of Gamlen, Hawke made a mental note to drop by the hovel on their way back to the docks and ensure he was alive. Maybe even bring him along – if the templars were even half as pissed as he expected them to be over Meredith’s death, they’d likely go straight for any member of his family they could get to. And if nothing else, Gamlen could warn Charade as well. 

Hawke looked to him. “I told Bodahn and Sandal that they should get moving before I went to meet with Orsino and everything... fell apart.” He’d recognized that things were about to hit the shaft when Orsino had insisted that the Champion come to the Gallows and knew that if the dwarves wanted to escape to Orlais, they’d be best off leaving then. Hawke had also opted to send Orana with them – things going crazy in Kirkwall would not have done her well and Bodahn had been a positive influence in her education, which had led to the elder dwarf becoming something of a replacement father figure for her as he had with Sandal. “Make sure that they got away safely, then come back here. If we’re still in the estate, come in and... gather mother’s belongings.” Three years after her death, Hawke had still had difficulties with even approaching the room that his mother had lived in. It burnt Hawke up inside to realize that Orsino had been the mysterious ‘O’ mentioned in Quentin’s notes and he regretted that he hadn’t been able to kill Orsino directly for that, just what Orsino had become.

Carver clearly understood his brother’s reluctance. “Of course, brother. I’ll head to the Keep first, see if the guard may have spotted them.” He spared a look at Anders, seemingly unsure if he should be an object of scorn or of pity. Hawke’s mabari, Dade, looked between Hawke and Carver. Hawke motioned for him to follow the younger Hawke – he needed to speak to Anders alone, and that included his trusted hound. Once he was gone, Anders looked to Hawke. Hawke kept his back turned. 

“I... I was glad that you wanted to-”

“Shut up.” Hawke hissed the words, the command so unlike the man who had spent the last three years with Anders. Anders’ mouth snapped shut. Hawke took a moment, composing himself. “I forgave you in the Mage’s Quarters because I needed you focused on fighting. I didn’t want ‘Justice’ turned on me.” He spoke of Justice with outright disdain. The anger Hawke felt was bubbling up to the surface.

Anders paused a moment, as if he were trying to give Hawke a chance to calm down. Fat bloody chance of that. “I know that you’re angry at me-”

Now Hawke’s face contorted with rage. The look on his face snapped Anders’s mouth shut. “Angry? I went past angry when Orsino said that he had been in contact with the bastard who killed my mother, maybe even supplied him with resources and protected him from being found out, then used blood magic, going against every reason I had to side with the Circle. I went past angry when the Knight-Commander ordered MY death for taking a stand against her illegal actions. You trying to pass blame for what you did on Justice or Vengeance or whatever the hell you want to call that damn thing in your head? That puts me way, WAY beyond angry.” Whatever emotion he was feeling, it was so far beyond merely ‘angry,’ there probably wasn’t a name for it. Hawke had invited a man into his life, his home, his bed, and that man had become a monster. When had that happened? He’d always been able to calm Anders down from his Justice rages in the past, like when they’d saved that mage girl from Ser Alrik. How had he not seen this coming?

And while Anders swore up and down he and Justice were one being, Hawke didn’t believe that. If they were one, then that had been Anders who had attempted to kill the young mage girl Ser Alrik had cornered below the city, and even if Anders wanted to paint himself a champion to the cause of mages, there was no possible way he had been planning to blow up the Chantry even then. Not given the way that Anders had reacted to just nearly killing the girl, that innocent, like the innocents who had died in the Chantry’s violent destruction. 

That reminded him of something else. “And you made me an accessory to your crimes. Elthina’s blood and the blood of everyone who was in that Chantry, to say nothing of the people who the fighting has killed, is on my hands just as much as it is on yours. You said it was a potion to separate the two of you and I believed you. I still helped you, even after you lied to me, got you into the Chantry, and you betrayed my trust by using that opportunity to place your bomb.” Hawke grabbed Anders by his robes and slammed him up against the wall. “You did that to someone who loved you, who you said you loved in return. That’s how you show your love?”

Anders squirmed, but Hawke’s grip was like iron. “If you hate me so much, why didn’t you kill me in Lowtown?”

“Because it would have made you a martyr. You stay alive, and the truth can be told. That you destroyed a Chantry and killed a Grand Cleric because you no longer cared about right or wrong. You decided that there wasn’t a chance for compromise. Worse than that, you didn’t want a compromise. You just wanted a war.” Hawke reached over and pulled open a curtain, revealing a city on fire and citizens in panic. The shouts could be heard through the walls and windows. He fixed Anders with a stony glare. “Congratulations, Anders. Or should I call you ‘Justice’? You’ve got your war.” Hawke had also stayed his hand because he’d been in love with Anders, but he had begun to wonder if the man that he had thought he’d loved had ever really existed. It was a question that was weighing heavily on him.

“I never wanted war. Just... to get freedom for men and women like us, who have this gift, and are locked away, unable to use it freely.”

“And that is magic being used freely,” Hawke said, against pointing out the window. “See how this ‘gift’ is making for a better world.”

Anders couldn’t meet his gaze, something that Hawke found strangely pleasing. That he seemed to genuinely feel remorse for what was happening lightened his spirits, because it meant that there was some part of him, however small, that knew what he had done was horrible. Which may not mean much when the Divine learned of what had happened and ordered an Exalted March upon Kirkwall in retribution, but it meant something for Hawke. 

“Understand something, Anders. I have always supported mages. I’ve always said that the Circle, AS IT STANDS, treats mages as dirt for the circumstances of their birth, makes them ashamed to be alive. But there’s also a reason for the Circle, that young mages need a place to learn to control their powers, rather than let them be controlled. Meredith had gone too far, but frankly, given all the rampant blood magic in this city, all the crazed mages who turn to it at the drop of a hat, I understand why she thought it was necessary. You call yourself the champion of the mages? You have no idea the temptation I have to let you join the ranks of the mages I’ve encountered in this city over the last seven years. You can take a place beside Orsino when they start the mass burnings. Is that what you want, Anders?!”

“I was fighting injustice,” Anders responded. Even that sounded half-hearted, as if even he couldn’t see the justice in this. 

That was not good enough for Hawke. Not by a long shot. “’Injustices’ are the deaths caused by YOU deciding that your way was the only way. That compromise was impossible.”

“You once admitted to me that you thought Elthina was hindering any chance for compromise, for finding a solution to the templar problem by not taking a firmer stance!” Anders countered.

Hawke stared at him, horrified at what it sounded like Anders was implying. “You think I wanted her dead? That the best solution was to blow her right to the Maker’s side? Plunge this city, possibly even the world beyond it, into open war between mages and templars? THAT was your better solution than compromise?!” His voice was rising, and Anders looked as if he was afraid that Hawke was about to hit him, maybe worse. Maybe he was. 

“What would you have me do, Hawke? Our people were being systematically locked away, many of them slaughtered or worse, made Tranquil, just because Meredith didn’t like how they looked at her that morning! The Grand Cleric never stopped her! That’s worse than condoning her actions, it’s ignoring that the problem exists!”

The problem was, Hawke agreed. By remaining silent, Elthina had implicitly granted Meredith the right to do whatever she wanted. She’d rarely emerged from the Chantry building, and she never went to see for herself whether or not Meredith had been overstepping her bounds. Rather than doing something about the very obvious problem that they were facing, Elthina had buried her head in the sand and hoped that things would resolve themselves without her intervention. They had been in the middle of a powder keg, and any spark could have set it off. But Anders didn’t have to have provided it.

“I never said that there weren’t problems. But you chose the very moment that things were about to come to a head. Orsino was demanding to get arbitration from the Grand Cleric. He was taking matters to her. There would have been a decision made!”

“And if Elthina had sided with Meredith? If she had decided that the mages were too great a threat and needed to all die?”

“The Rite of Annulment wasn’t invoked until you destroyed the Chantry.”

“But what would you have done?” 

For a moment, Hawke looked Anders over, and had a slow realization of what Anders was doing. He wanted Hawke’s approval, in any fashion. Something that he could consider as Hawke agreeing with the actions he had taken. “I don’t know what I would have done. I never got the chance to find out. You and your mad quest for what you deemed ‘justice’ took away the option. Do you have any idea, any ability to grasp the consequences of what’s happened here today?”

That, Anders did have an answer for. He straightened up. “Mages across Thedas will hear of what has happened here. They will rise up against their templar oppressors, and they will strike back. They will make sure that no child is taken from their parents for a gift they did not ask for. They will ensure that no more mages will be made tranquil. They will show the world that magic is a blessing and that-”

“That what, Anders? That mages would be left without oversight? That we’d all become servants to the next generation of Tevinter magisters?” Again Hawke motioned out the window. “That is magic without restrictions, Anders! There is no justice in that. Just blind panic, violence, death, and destruction. Out there, the innocent and the guilty face the same judgment.” He shook his head in disgust. “You are no champion of justice. You were a healer once. How could you think of this as the right answer?”

“How could there be any other? Evil prevails when good men do nothing.”

“Don’t you dare call what you have done an act of good.” Hawke was beginning to realize that there was no arguing with Anders about this – if given the option, he wouldn’t take back what he had done. Hawke was beginning to wonder if it might not be better to just kill Anders and have Varric tell the truth of the matter so that history would remember that Anders hadn’t done what he had done for noble purposes but just because he had decided that there needed to be war.

But Anders shook his head. “I will not be the judge. History will tell the tale of how mage freedom came about from my actions.”

Hawke backhanded him, an act that he never would have believed he would do, and yet it had seemed like the only thing he could. “Or history will tell the tale of how your actions led to every subsequent child with magic to be executed at the first sign. You are a fool! You did not even consider what your actions would do to the future, just in the now.”

For the briefest of moments, there was sadness, pain, remorse, all the emotions that Hawke longed to see in Anders, to see a sign that perhaps, just perhaps, the man he had loved had existed and had been real, that he’d merely been buried by something so much stronger than he was and was now trying to break through. Then his eyes turned cold. Worse than that. They began to glow with an unearthly light. 

Justice was in control.

“You do not understand, mortal! This was the only way to justice!”

“And who brings YOU to justice for the lives you’ve cost today? Or are they just casualties of war? You are not Justice anymore, spirit. You are a demon!” Hawke snarled, having had more than his fill of the creature who shared Anders’ body.

Justice roared with rage and flew towards Hawke-

Only to be dropped by the pommel of a broadsword held by Carver. Justice/Anders fell to the floor, unconscious. Carver looked to his older brother, a small smirk appearing on his face. “It looked like you could use a hand, brother.”

Summoning up a grin that he didn’t feel, Hawke nodded. “I suppose it did at that. Thank you, Carver.” Dade trotted in behind Carver, his ears pressing flat against his head and a low growl emerging as he looked to the unconscious apostate... The unconscious abomination. Hawke sighed. Dade had always been reluctant to be around Anders. Fereldan wisdom said that if a mabari didn’t like someone, it said more about the person than the mabari. Why hadn’t he listened?

Carver holstered his sword and looked over Anders, then to Hawke. “So... What are we going to do with him?”

That was the rub. What could they do with him? Killing him at this point might very well be a mercy to the man that Hawke had loved, but what if the spirit wasn’t drawn back to the Fade, instead trying to find one of the mages who’d survived the templar attack on the Circle and convince them to join with it and continue its mission? But if they left him alive, who knew what else he’d do?

Hawke sighed. “I never thought I’d miss the qunari and their ability to leash their mages,” he muttered, then felt disgusted at the very idea of using a sarebaas collar. 

It was at that point that there was a loud knock on the door. Hawke and Carver shared a look. Hawke gripped his staff as he moved towards the door while Carver grabbed his sword again. Hawke opened the door and found Knight Captain Cullen standing there.

He seemed unfazed at the stances of the Hawke brothers. “Sirah Hawke.” He held up his hands, indicating that he wasn’t there for a further fight. “I understand your apprehension, but I bear no ill will towards you. I was coming to make sure you’d arrived home safely.”

“We’re not staying, if that’s what you’re concerned about,” Hawke stated.

“That’s probably for the best. The citizens of Kirkwall are frightened at the moment, but once things die down, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they want to know why the Champion didn’t defend the Grand Cleric.” All three of them rolled their eyes in disgust at the attitude – all of Hawke’s actions were supposed to be based upon knowledge that he couldn’t have had... though, truthfully, he did blame himself for Elthina’s death. That one, he felt rested on his shoulders.

“My thanks for the warning. We’ll be out of your hair shortly.”

Cullen seemed to pause for a moment. It appeared that he’d finally noticed Anders, sprawled out on the floor, under the watchful eye of Dade. “I take it you and your... companion have had something of a disagreement?” he asked, a hint of scorn in his tone. 

“Something like that. We were debating what to do with him,” Carver stated.

“In truth, sirahs, I’d like it best if you’d turn him over to the templars. If we could have some form of public example of punishment for what has happened... It could go a long way in pacifying the public. However, the decision is yours.” 

“It’s rather tempting, Knight-Captain. But he is our... MY responsibility. I’ll decide his fate, not public opinion.”

The de facto templar leader didn’t appear pleased at Hawke’s decision, but he seemed to accept that it was Hawke’s to make. “If that’s the case, sirah, I’d recommend that you vacate the city swiftly.” With that, Cullen made his exit. 

“So we’re taking him with us, then?” Carver asked. Dade growled again, indicating his displeasure with the idea.

“I don’t see a better option. Kill him here, that damnable demon inside of him may try and move on to a mage who survived the templar assault. I don’t think we want to risk that happening.” Carver made a face at the idea, not liking it either. Hawke nodded. “That’s what I thought. We’re going to have to take him with us.” It was going to be difficult, but they were going to have to load him up on the boat and bring him along, wherever they were going to go. 

With a disgusted sigh, Carver shook his head. “I don’t like it, brother. Seems to just be asking for more trouble. But I’ll follow your lead on this. He’s your demon.”

Hawke looked down at the unconscious Anders. “Yes. He is at that.”


End file.
